Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
In a February blog post for the Theopolis Institute, Benoît Engel offers a thought-provoking challenge to the widely accepted five-discourse structure of Matthew’s Gospel, proposing a sixth discourse in Matthew 21:28–22:14 to reframe the Gospel’s chiastic center. As someone deeply invested in Matthew’s literary design—explored in my book Reading Matthew,…
Avoid foolish disputes, genealogies, contentions, and strivings about the law, for they are unprofitable and useless. Titus 3:9 Out of a deep love and care for the church, Paul tells Titus and those in the church to avoid four specific things: foolish disputes, genealogies, contentions, and strivings about the law.…
Theopolis publishes many polemics, especially on the Sacraments. This piece does not necessarily reflect the views of Theopolis, her board, or her editors. -JW Whoever touches the dead body of any person shall be unclean seven days.He shall cleanse himself with the water on the third day and on the…
There is in the United States and the Western World some sort of religious revival occurring. Gen Z men—males born between ca 1997 and 2012—are flooding back in to churches. USA Today noted that Gen Z men—and to a lesser degree women—attending churches more than their millennial predecessors and they…
The primary task of many Biblical scholars (as they see it) is to explain how and why the Biblical text acquired its final form—i.e., what source material it used, how that material was expanded/redacted, who expanded/redacted it, why they did so, what the weather was like at the time, etc.…
Galatians 5:5-15 For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? This persuasion is not from…
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The thesis of Kevin Kruse's One Nation Under God is that “the postwar revolution in America's religious identity had its roots not in the foreign policy panic of the 1950s but rather in the domestic politics of the 1930s and early 1940s. Decades before Eisenhower's inaugural prayers, corporate titans enlisted…
Matthew Levering presents a typically careful, judicious summary of David Novak's analysis of supersessionism in his Christian-Jewish Dialogue and the Life of Wisdom . Along the way he points out (following Novak) that even Christian rejection of “harsh supersessionism” (which claims that Jews have no continuing covenantal status) doesn't overcome…
In a contribution to Judaism and Christianity , Evan Zuesse questions how H. Richard Niebuhr's analysis of Christ and culture might apply to Judaism. While he recognizes that Jewish responses to culture fit roughly into Niebuhr's categories, he finds that the whole set-up doesn't stand up to close analysis: “if…
Yahweh descends on Sinai surrounded by a fiery cloud, full of thunder and lightning. When we get a closer look at the cloud, as we do in Ezekiel, we realize that it is a cloud of angels. Yahweh moves about surrounded by the fiery horses and chariots of His hosts.…
Patrick Deneen nails it next door at the main First Things site. Read the whole article, but here are a few money quote:s “The decision by corporate leaders to take a political stand over a controversial issue is therefore of great interest. Corporations and business leaders almost always avoid political…
In his commentary on St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians , JB Lightfoot ran through the possible meanings of ta sitgmata , the “brand marks of Christ” that Paul says he bore (Galatians 6:17). Stigmata marked “domestic slaves. With these, however, branding was not usual, at least among Greeks and…
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